![\"977C4ADF-963E-4B97-B266-997339257268.jpg\"](\"https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/2098/2020/329c98696e.jpg\")
šµ Todayās listen: Boston by Boston. Iām trying something retro for a rare weekend gym day.
\n", "date_published": "2023-03-12T13:31:04-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/03/12/todays-listen-boston.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/03/06/today-seems-like.html", "content_html": "Ā šµ Today seems like a good day to listen to a ton of Lana Del Rey.
\n", "date_published": "2023-03-06T10:00:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/03/06/today-seems-like.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/02/15/im-just-playing.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m just playing the hits today.
\n", "date_published": "2023-02-15T10:27:26-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/02/15/im-just-playing.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/02/06/todays-listen-dog.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: Dog Problems by The Format. It’s a classic combination of feel-good music and “I feel bad” breakup lyrics. Nate Ruess, who fronted this band before he sang with fun., has a distinctive voice. Standout tracks include “Time Bomb,” “The Compromise,” and “Snails.”
\n", "date_published": "2023-02-06T15:54:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/02/06/todays-listen-dog.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/02/03/todays-listen-in.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: In The Aeroplane Over the Sea by Neutral Milk Hotel. It’s an indie rock masterpiece. That’s all I can say.
\n", "date_published": "2023-02-03T12:22:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/02/03/todays-listen-in.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/02/02/todays-listen-groundhog.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen, Groundhog Day The Musical (Original Broadway Cast Recording), composed by Tim Minchin. It is wonderful and timely.
\n", "date_published": "2023-02-02T12:55:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/02/02/todays-listen-groundhog.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/02/01/todays-listen-come.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: Come Get Your Wife by Elle King. Much of it is fun, “angry woman” country music. Whether you enjoy it or not probably hinges on how much you like its hit single, “Drunk (And I Donāt Wanna Go Home),” which is a duet with Miranda Lambert.
\n", "date_published": "2023-02-01T15:51:49-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/02/01/todays-listen-come.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/01/31/todays-listen-john.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: John Coltrane and John Hartman I just learned about this album this week. As far as I know, it is the only vocal jazz/standards album John Coltrane ever made. John Hartman has a deep, silky voice that’s so good I am surprised I never heard of him before.
\n", "date_published": "2023-01-31T09:31:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/01/31/todays-listen-john.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/01/30/todays-listen-heaven.html", "title": "šµ Today's listen: Heaven or Las Vegas", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: Heaven or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins. This is purported to be one of the greatest albums of the 1990s, and a foundation for the dream pop and shoegaze subgenres. I never listened to it before today. I liked it but didn’t love it enough to keep it in my library. I think its genre may not be for me.
\n", "date_published": "2023-01-30T16:16:20-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/01/30/todays-listen-heaven.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/01/27/todays-listen-to.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: To Venus and Back by Tori Amos. I haven’t listened to this album in many years, but I remember liking it in 1999 and 2000. I remember Tori Amos being very divisive when I was in high school (in the mid 1990s); I can’t remember why.
\n", "date_published": "2023-01-27T12:04:11-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/01/27/todays-listen-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2023/01/26/radio-paradise.html", "title": "šµ Radio Paradise", "content_html": "One thing that has been making me happy lately is Radio Paradise, which is an Internet radio station. Several things about it make it special:
\nIt is completely ad-free. It runs on the public radio model, in that it is listener-supported. A DJ breaks in between songs a couple times an hour to say hello and remind listeners that they can donate. These breaks never annoy me.
\nIts “Main Mix” is the best eclectic rock radio station I have ever listened to. The songs played on this station range from huge hits to album tracks I have never heard of. It has no pretentious or underground vibe: whatever is playing is always interesting, musical, and accessible.
\nIt streams high quality audio. I listen to its AAC 320 Kbps stream, because my Apple devices support it. There is also a lossless FLAC stream, if your hardware can play it. Most Internet radio I listen has much worse audio quality, like 64 Kbps or (if you’re lucky) 128 Kbps MP3.
\nIts web player is great, it has apps for many platforms if you want them, and it can be streamed from third-party Internet radio apps as well.
\nI highly recommend giving it a try.
\n", "date_published": "2023-01-26T11:23:51-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2023/01/26/radio-paradise.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/10/22/taylor-swift-releases.html", "content_html": "šµ Taylor Swift Releases 7 New Songs Just Hours After New Album Midnights: Listen. Taylor Swift is crazy, y’all.
\n", "date_published": "2022-10-22T16:09:34-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/10/22/taylor-swift-releases.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/10/20/who-else-is.html", "content_html": "šµ Who else is looking forward to Taylor Swiftās new album? My daughter and I are anxiously awaiting its release tomorrow.
\n", "date_published": "2022-10-20T19:38:05-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/10/20/who-else-is.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/09/17/todays-listen-autofiction.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: Autofiction by (The London) Suede. Itās really good! They went āpunkā after 30 years. š
\n", "date_published": "2022-09-17T09:45:12-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/09/17/todays-listen-autofiction.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/09/16/todays-listen-asphalt.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: Asphalt Meadows by Death Cab for Cutie. Iām excited to hear new music from one of my favorite bands from the aughts.
\n", "date_published": "2022-09-16T10:16:28-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/09/16/todays-listen-asphalt.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/28/todays-listen-gold.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: Gold by Sister Sparrow. Apple Music labels it an āAlternativeā album, but it is blue-eyed soul all the way. My favorite track is āCanāt Get You Out of My Mindā; itās fierce and fun.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-28T20:43:48-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/28/todays-listen-gold.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/27/todays-listen-firstborn.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: firstborn by Nicolle Gaylon. It is a veteran country songwriterās first album. It is full of autobiographical songs which are, interestingly, chronologically ordered from birth to death.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-27T15:43:40-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/27/todays-listen-firstborn.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/26/todays-listen-emotional.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: Emotional Creature by Beach Bunny. I loved this emo-pop bandās debut LP, Honeymoon, a couple years ago. I didnāt know this album was out, so Iām excited to listen to it. The lead single, Oxygen, is good.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-26T11:01:09-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/26/todays-listen-emotional.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/19/an-update-on.html", "title": "š§ An update on the Sony WH-1000M4", "content_html": "A little while ago, I bemoaned that the Sony WH-1000M4 headphones were disappointing to me. Iām happy to report they have been working pretty well as my gym headphones. The fit is pretty good (they donāt fall off unless Iām practically upside down) and the sound plus noise cancellation are more than adequate. The creakiness I observed when they were brand new seems to have gone away. My only complaint is that, when I bring my iPad with me to watch TV shows while doing cardio, it can be a pain to get the headphones to connect to it. They seem to want to connect only to my phone.
\nMy gym almost never plays music, which is great because everybody wears some kind of wireless headphones there. I mostly see AirPods Pro around the gym, but a few people have the AirPods Max, and I wish I did, too. Their tighter fit and punchier sound, compared to the Sony WH-1000M4, would be welcome. A handful of other people at my gym use the same headphones I do, so I donāt feel crazy for not using purpose-built workout headphones there.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-19T23:54:50-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/19/an-update-on.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/19/todays-listen-stop.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen, Stop the Clocks by Oasis. It is a greatest hits album that is supposedly curated by the band to resemble on of their live show setlists. It is all the Oasis I need, and maybe a bit more.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-19T23:43:35-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/19/todays-listen-stop.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/15/todays-listen-the.html", "content_html": "š® Todayās listen: The London Suede and Similar Artists Station on Apple Music. This is probably a personalized BritPop playlist. Iām discovering a lot of album cuts I didnāt know about or bother listening to in the 1990s. Also, I now think Blur holds up far better than Oasis.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-15T11:26:22-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/15/todays-listen-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Gaming"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/13/todays-listen-i.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: I Miss Britpop. Because I do.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-13T09:37:05-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/13/todays-listen-i.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/07/08/oh-schiit.html", "title": "Oh, Schiit", "content_html": "My Schiit Magni 3 amplifier is acting up again. Tonight it is ground loop hum. Before tonight, it has been annoyingly sensitive (that is, it pops loudly) to the tiny amount of static electricity generated by my feet scuffing the low-pile carpet when I rise from my chair. When I stand up while wearing my headphones, it pops very loudly, which is painful to my ears, and then it will hum angrily the rest of the day.
\nWhen the Magni 3 works it is sublime. Unfortunately, I canāt always use it due to electrical issues, and I wonder if the popping problem could blow out my headphones someday. Early in its life it got fried and I had to RMA it. Iām not sure it is worth spending $80 or more for a power conditioner to try to fix it. I think it may be more trouble than it is worth.
\n", "date_published": "2022-07-08T22:58:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/07/08/oh-schiit.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/05/20/sony-whm-headphones.html", "title": "š§ Sony WH-1000M4 headphones are just OK and that sucks", "content_html": "Listening to the AirPods Max for five minutes in an Apple Store ruined me for other noise-canceling headphones. Not because they sounded good. In fact, I listened to them only long enough to learn that they are bass heavy and exciting. What wowed me about them was the active noise cancellation. It was far better than anything I had ever experienced. It made the din of the Apple Storeāall those human voices, which are difficult for ANC to cancel outāgo away completely.
\nSadly, they are $550 headphones (street price $479) that donāt even have an analog headphone jack, so they are both outside my price range and unsuitableāat least for meāfor listening to lossless quality audio. Still, I wanted āindustry leadingā active noise cancellation, something better than I already have in my fancy Beoplay H9, for the times that I need it.
\nI read a lot of ANC headphone reviews and came to the conclusion that most reviewers recommend the Sony WH-1000M4 for its sound, excellent noise cancellation, and price. At $300 (street price $279) they are not cheap, but one could buy them and the AirPods Pro for cheaper than the AirPods Max (at its list price). Also, compared to the AirPods Max, the Sony WH-1000M4 is lighter, folds into a small, protective case, and has a headphone jack for wired listening.
\nI received them and immediately discovered that I donāt love them. They are fine, but that is disappointing to me. Perhaps they are overhyped by reviewers. Perhaps I am asking too much from them. For whatever reason, I, unlike most people, I guess, think they fall short of greatness.
\nThis is my list of complaints that should serve as a counterpoint to all the glowing, uncritical reviews.
\nI probably should have returned the Sony WH-1000M4 while I still had the chance. While I do expect to use them during walks on the treadmill and for plane travel in the future, I find that I almost always choose the Beoplay H9 over them for my everyday home-office-with-the-air-conditioner-on listening.
\nI realize that part of my problem is that I have too many audiophile-quality headphones already. If I were comparing the Sony WH-1000M4 with my aging (non-Pro) AirPods, I would probably think they sound great. ↩︎
\nTo my amazement, my kids seem to like jazz. By ālikeā, I mean donāt seem to mind, which I will consider a win. They donāt mind when I play John Coltrane (who is one of my favorite jazz musicians) on the kitchen smart speaker. They donāt blink an eye when albums like Jazz at the Pawnshop or Kind of Blue are playing. Today, I put on a Louis Armstrong playlist during breakfast, told my kids about him while I was playing, and my daughter expressed actually excitement about it. She told us that had learned a little bit about Louis Armstrong in school.
\nPlaying jazz at some of our family mealtimes started accidentally. One evening I was too tired to think of anything to listen to while cooking dinner, so I told our Amazon Echo speaker to play ācool musicā. I thought it would return a playlist of avant-garde pop music or underground dance- or world-music artists I havenāt heard off. Instead, to my surprise, Alexa cooly replied, āNow playing cool jazz on Apple Music.ā I thought that was hilarious. I grew up thinking that cool jazz music was terrible, hopelessly lame easy-listening crap, which is the furthest thing from ācoolā you could imagine. It turned out that my wife and I kind of liked the cool jazz playlist; it made for pleasant background music. More importantly, the kids didnāt ask for it to be turned off immediately.
\nSince that accidental discovery, the breadth of jazz that I put on for them has increased dramatically. I think this is a great development because I grew up in a house without music, and had to learn about all the different genres on my own. I am still trying to work on introducing my kids to classical music, but that has been a much harder sell.
\n", "date_published": "2022-04-23T13:06:51-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/04/23/jazz-music-is.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/04/13/betwixt.html", "title": "šµ Betwixt", "content_html": "When I was in college at Brandeis University, a friend of a friend1 was in a band. A cool band. He played cello in Betwixt, which was, at the time, a critically-acclaimed Boston-based noise/art-rock band. They played a few shows on campus, and Iām pretty sure I saw them play in Boston at least once, too. It was always a blast to see them perform. Their onstage vibe was cool and sexy. The singer was always dancing and working the crowd, while the lead guitarist stood in the back doing everything he could to avoid playing a normal guitar line. His guitar, amp, and effects pedals were coerced into making the most unusual sounds, all rhythmically slotted into into cheerful, poppy tunes. All together, they blew my mind.
\nI found their music on Apple Music today and listened to their two albums, Moustache and The Salty Tang. It was a fun nostalgia trip.
\nAnd fellow Brandeisian. ↩︎
\nWatch this video: āHurtā by Johnny Cash. I dare you.
\nEverything about Cashās performance is powerful. Honestly, though, the music videoās imagery is perfectly attuned to the music and to the singer. Director Mark Romanek and his small team who made the video were working at the top of the game.
\n(I didnāt just learn about this song or video. On Friday, I watched a short documentary about music producer Rick Rubin that reminded me of it.)
\n", "date_published": "2022-03-27T21:57:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/03/27/do-you-really.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/03/27/fthc-by-frank.html", "title": "šµ FTHC by Frank Turner", "content_html": "One of my favorite artists from the last few years, Frank Turner, has a new album out: FTHC.1 Itāat least parts of itārepresents a swing back from his acoustic guitar-led singer-songwriter fare to his roots as a hardcore artist. Yes, that means itās peppered with screaming and righteous anger. That usually isnāt my cup of tea, but Iām down with it. Frank Turner is cool and makes good records; you should listen to them.
\nWhat I love about Frank Turner is that he comes across as incredibly, even uncomfortably, open and honest. His songs mix together toughness with sensitivity, and cynicism with optimism, in a way that reveals both his maturity as a person and his cleverness when it comes to song structure. His lyrics range from poetic and clever to raw and emotional. His music ranges from quiet and beautiful to thunderous and anthemicāoften in the same song. Overall, his albums give you the impression that he held nothing back in creating them. I very much respect and admire that.2
\nUnlike any other musician I can think of, Turner even did a very generous two-part interview with a tech podcast, Dialog, a few years ago. He talked about his songwriting process and what it was like to be a working musician who is a little older and wiser than the clichƩd young rock star you might imagine.
\nAccording to Wikipedia, it is an initialization of āFrank Turner Hardcore.ā ↩︎
\nAnother artist I like that does the same thing is The Avett Brothers. (Interestingly, The Avett Brothers were once a punk band that evolved into an acoustic Americana band, which is not too different from Turnerās evolution from a punk singer to a singer-songwriter.) ↩︎
\nšµ I love the album All Mirrors by Angel Olsen. Everything about it is stunning.
\n", "date_published": "2022-02-11T18:21:34-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/02/11/i-love-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2022/02/11/a-new-album.html", "content_html": "šµ A new album from an old favorite of mine dropped today: Lucifer on the Sofa by Spoon. A straight-ahead rock album is a great excuse to turn up my speakers today.
\n", "date_published": "2022-02-11T11:55:44-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2022/02/11/a-new-album.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/12/07/im-enjoying-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām enjoying āThe Weeknd Essentialsā playlist while I work this morning. I have learned to appreciate his music over the past two years. I was familiar with his biggest hits, but I wasnāt sold on his sound until Due Lipaās āFuture Nostalgiaā came out and reminded me how cool and sexy modern 80s-inspired R&B can be.
\n", "date_published": "2021-12-07T11:05:53-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/12/07/im-enjoying-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/11/19/i-have-listend.html", "content_html": "šµ I have listened to Adele’s new album, 30, about five times today. I’m into it!
\n", "date_published": "2021-11-19T17:42:46-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/11/19/i-have-listend.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/11/17/i-cant-wait.html", "content_html": "šµ I canāt wait to listen to Adeleās upcoming album, 30, which is coming out on the 19th. I have been looking forward to it for weeks.
\n", "date_published": "2021-11-17T22:40:25-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/11/17/i-cant-wait.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/11/13/red-taylors-version.html", "title": "šµ Red (Taylorās Version)", "content_html": "One thing I didnāt expect when listening to Taylor Swiftās honest-to-goodness money-grab re-recording of her album Red is how good it is, and how many songs she added to it. Hell, Red (Taylorās Version), even sounds better. The engineering and production are amazing, and I very much enjoy listening to it on my best speakers and headphones.
\nNow I am very much looking forward to Swiftās re-recordings of 1989 and Speak Now, which are my daughterās favorite records. 1989 in particular already sounds fantastic, from an audiophile perspective; thatās going to be a tough act to follow.
\n", "date_published": "2021-11-13T18:17:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/11/13/red-taylors-version.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/11/09/cool-jazz.html", "title": "šµ Cool jazz", "content_html": "This is my music find of the week.
\nI asked my Amazon Echo speaker to play ācool musicā while I was making dinner and had no idea what I wanted to listen to. (I was hungry and tired, and couldnāt even name an artist of a genre at that point.) Alexa starting playing a āCool Jazzā radio station on Apple Music, and it was actually perfect background music for making and eating dinner. Now I have an alternative to ālo-fi hip hopā which the rest of my family hates. (OK, to be fair, my kids hate the jazz music too.)
\n", "date_published": "2021-11-09T11:05:16-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/11/09/cool-jazz.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/11/05/best-of-you.html", "title": "šµ Best of You", "content_html": "Do I like Foo Fighters now? Today Iām loving when their tracks come up on my randomized Apple Music post-album ā (āinfinityā) playlist.
\nI have had a grudge against that band since I saw them in concert almost 20 years ago and hated their set. Maybe Dave Grohl was having a bad day that day. I thought he hated the crowd, of which a small majority, including me, were there to see the co-headliner, Weezer, who performed before him.
\n", "date_published": "2021-11-05T10:32:59-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/11/05/best-of-you.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/10/27/i-listened-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I listened to Lana Del Rayās new album, Blue Banisters today, plus a new single by Beach Bunny, and enjoyed them very much. Adeleās new album is coming out soon, and I am really looking forward to it, too.
\n", "date_published": "2021-10-27T21:37:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/10/27/i-listened-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/09/28/material-obsessions.html", "title": "Material obsessions", "content_html": "I have two collections that I love but cannot justify: high-end headphones (each is sub-$500, but still really expensive and good) and mechanical keyboards (each is $240 or less). It took ten years to build up these collections, so the embarrassing amount of money I have spent is spread out over a long, long period. I was wondering today if people who spend a lot more than I do on vacations do so because they forego (and donāt care about) material objects like pricy headphones and keyboards.
\nGetting into these āhobbiesā (if buying stuff can be called a hobby) was entirely accidental. Iām part of a product review program where I can occasionally select products I like for no money up front, and then only pay taxes on their value months later. I got my first taste of better headphones and better keyboards through that program, essentially through the luck of the draw. (Iām not in charge of which products become available for me to review.) If not for that, I probably would have no other headphones other than my AirPods, and would probably have a $100 Microsoft or Logitech keyboard that I would have to replace (because of wear) every year or two.
\nI think I am finally nearing āendgameā in both of these categories. I have fantastic headphones of nearly every type (dynamic and planar magnetic, open-back and closed-back, Bluetooth and wired), and they cover every situation, that I need. Similarly, I have mechanical keyboards for all of my computers, have tried a bunch of different key switches (clicky, tactile, and linear), and have even bought a āweirdā ortholinear board that I never thought I would ever want until a couple months ago. Any new keyboard purchases are going to be about fixing something that is broken (my wonderful and unacceptably buggy Durgod tenkeyless) or trying out a different type of keyswitch on my new, hot-swappable ortholinear board. At least I hope that will be the case. Collecting more and more of these objects sometimes feels like an obsession, and is not something I want to keep doing forever.
\n", "date_published": "2021-09-28T21:14:54-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/09/28/material-obsessions.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Thoughts","Keyboards"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/08/16/background-music-and.html", "title": "Background music and Endel", "content_html": "Sometimes when Iām working, I want music playing, but I donāt really know what I want to listen to, and I donāt have the patience to think about it. In these situations, I have tried listening to classical music, jazz, and lo-fi (hip-hop/trip-hop, etc.). Over the past week, I gave Endel an honest try, too.
\nWhile I enjoy classical music in a live setting, I donāt like listening to it in my headphones. Its wide dynamic range makes it so that I canāt hear some sections of it, and other sections are too loud. That doesnāt work for me; I want something that is not too loud, but is completely audible, all the time.
\nJazz (especially classic jazz) was what I listened to almost exclusively during my senior year of college. It got me through reading and writing hundreds and hundreds of pages of text. However, I find my engagement with jazz to be all over the map. I love some of it and I hate some of it, and the kind of jazz you can just have on, not listening toāsmooth jazz, I supposeāis just bad. All in all, I find jazz too distracting to listen to while I work, unless I listen to a single album that I already know and love.
\nLo-fi hip hop is my favorite background music at this point. I appreciate its nearly constant beat, somewhat consistent tempos, and there appears to be a never-ending supply of it. My wife hates when I play it in the house when I am doing chores or writing, though, which means I can only really listen to it via headphones when Iām around her. It works great on my headphones while I read on my iPad, or through my loudspeakers when I work.
\nOver the past two weeks, I tried to get into Endel, which offers an AI-based soundscape that constantly changes and continually evolves as you listen to it. I like the idea a lot more than the reality of it, though I think it has a lot to do with my tinnitus. Endel is extremely treble-heavy and bass-light (really, there is no bass at all), and only one of its scenarios, Focus, has a beat. I would not describe the sounds as shrill, but they aggravate my tinnitus instead of helping me ignore it. Last week, I listened to Endel exclusively through headphones (my B&O H9s and my AirPods) while I did chores like the dishes and laundry. This morning, now that I am back at work, I tried listening to the Focus soundscape for a few hours through my loudspeakers. It drove my wife and both my kids absolutely bananas. Each of them yelled at me to stop playing it, even though it was not playing loudly, and they were on a different level of the house. After that experience, I think I will not be buying an Endel lifetime subscription.
\nTomorrow I plan to listen to Lofi Girl for much of my workday. That is the best bet for me, when I canāt make up my mind about music and need to focus on my work more than what I am listening to.
\n", "date_published": "2021-08-16T21:47:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/08/16/background-music-and.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Journal","Productivity"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/07/12/the-nuclear-option.html", "title": "The nuclear option, or how I gave up completely (on my music library) šµ š£ š„", "content_html": "I have been an Apple Music subscriber from the serviceās very first day. I was an iTunes Match subscriber before that. I have been pulling an enormous electronic library of albums and songs forward with me since I was a teenager. Weāre talking about thousands of albums, dozens of playlists, and a lot of complications that have stuck around in my library since the CD days.
\nApple Music gobbled up all that music info and turned it into a frustrating mess for me. I have duplicate albums, duplicate tracks in my albums, unplayable tracks in some albums, and most of my library does not play in Apple Musicās new lossless format. A lot of music playing for me takes place outside my library, but that is in large part because my Apple Music library is an awful mess.
\nToday, I just couldnāt take the jankiness anymore, so I took the nuclear option: I deleted everything from from my Apple Music account. All my music is gone. I also turned off the āadd songs from playlists added to libraryā option, which was inconsistently applied amongst my devices, and peppered my library with useless, one-track albums. I added some of the artists and albums I actually listen to now (as opposed to many years ago when I bought a used CD somewhere), and will rebuild my collection from there.
\nDespite my nuking of my Apple Music Library, None of the music I bought in the past is really gone. All the CDs I actually wanted to keep are ripped to a well-organized, if rarely touched, folder on my NAS. I will probably continue to ignore this, to be honest, and focus mainly on whatās new.
\n", "date_published": "2021-07-12T16:49:33-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/07/12/the-nuclear-option.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/06/27/i-keep-eyeing.html", "content_html": "I keep eyeing the AirPods Max listing on Amazon. The price is dropping below $500 now. They donāt seem perfect and I only tried them for a second but the noise cancellation puts the NC in my Beoplay H9 to shame.
\n", "date_published": "2021-06-27T20:36:27-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/06/27/i-keep-eyeing.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Apple"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/06/22/i-turned-on.html", "content_html": "š§ I turned on the crazy hi-res audio settings on my Mac tonight. I want to justify why I have an expensive DAC. š
\n", "date_published": "2021-06-22T23:25:42-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/06/22/i-turned-on.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/06/09/i-have-been.html", "content_html": "I have been listening to Apple Musicās āMade for Spatial Audioā tracks all morning with my external DAC and my closed-back planar magnetic headphones. So far, I have decided that I prefer the lossless stereo mixes to the Dolby Atmos mixes. I guess I prefer a narrower soundstage.
\n", "date_published": "2021-06-09T11:52:56-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/06/09/i-have-been.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/06/08/i-am-appreciating.html", "content_html": "I am appreciating the lossless tracks on Apple Music. I probably donāt have the ears to actually hear the difference anymore. But my equipment is good enough to make use of the extra bits, I am listening more closely than usual, and I am enjoying it.
\n", "date_published": "2021-06-08T14:32:58-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/06/08/i-am-appreciating.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/06/08/oh-cool-apple.html", "content_html": "Oh, cool: Apple Musicās lossless audio quality tier is now live. Check out iOS Settings > Music to turn it on.
\n", "date_published": "2021-06-08T00:15:53-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/06/08/oh-cool-apple.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Apple"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/29/s-pop-like.html", "content_html": "ā60s pop like The Four Seasons sounds great from the tiny, terrible, mono Amazon Echo speaker in my kitchen. The music must have been mixed with transistor radios in mind.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-29T15:50:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/29/s-pop-like.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/24/i-love-the.html", "content_html": "šµ I love the new Bleachers single āStop Making this Hurt.ā
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-24T11:27:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/24/i-love-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/20/lossless-music-discussion.html", "title": "Lossless Music Discussion on ATP Podcast", "content_html": "The latest episode of Accidental Tech Podcast has a great discussion about lossless music, which is coming to Apple Music next month.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-20T12:58:30-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/20/lossless-music-discussion.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Gaming","TV","Keyboards"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/18/webex-has-virtual.html", "title": "WebEx has virtual backgrounds?!", "content_html": "A software update at work pushed out the virtual backgrounds feature for WebEx. Since my home officeāat least the part of it that is behind me and not under my controlā is a mess, I enabled it.
\nSadly, it looks pretty awful. The background mostly leaves a halo around me un-obscured; sometimes it clips portions of my face or shoulder off. I have a very high-end laptop and a āvery goodā Logitech webcam (all webcams are terrible, I think), so I have concluded that WebExās technology is way behind Zoomās, which does the virtual backgrounds flawlessly. I think I will leave virtual backgrounds on, for privacy reasons, and hope no one minds the weird visual side effects.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-18T09:47:26-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/18/webex-has-virtual.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Gaming","TV","Keyboards"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/17/i-did-not.html", "content_html": "I did not have to wait long for the Apple Music announcement to drop.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-17T10:16:43-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/17/i-did-not.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/17/apple-music-can.html", "content_html": "Apple Music can release its rumored lossless tier any minute now. Iām waiting with my best headphones. I donāt care at all about spatial audio or Dolby Atmos, though, so I hope that isnāt the only kind of thing coming.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-17T09:08:43-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/17/apple-music-can.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Apple"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/05/01/is-a-higherquality.html", "title": "Is a higher-quality Apple Music tier on the way?", "content_html": "I hope so. I am a sucker for lossless codecs, even though I probably canāt hear the difference between them and AAC-256.
\n", "date_published": "2021-05-01T15:46:15-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/05/01/is-a-higherquality.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Apple","News"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/04/29/im-going-to.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām going to lean into my New Jersey-ness today and listen to a ton of Bruce Springsteen. First album up: The Wild, The Innocent, & the E Street Shuffle. This is one of Springsteenās records that I never think to listen to, but, of course, itās great. It was made back when Springsteen still wrote songs with a torrent of stream-of-consciousness-style lyrics like a verbose street poet.
\n", "date_published": "2021-04-29T09:09:51-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/04/29/im-going-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/04/27/i-think-it.html", "content_html": "šµ I think it is cool that Counting Crows is releasing a new album next month. It has been seven years since their last one, and I honestly thought they had given up writing new material.
\n", "date_published": "2021-04-27T09:42:55-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/04/27/i-think-it.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/04/06/im-listening-to.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām listening to Gaslighter by The Chicks again today. It is one of my favorite albums of 2020. Everything is great about it, from the catchy choruses to the close harmonies to the clean production. My favorite part of it is the songwriting, which is fueled with righteous anger and makes for compelling country-pop music.
\n", "date_published": "2021-04-06T11:28:54-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/04/06/im-listening-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/03/30/im-enjoying-the.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m enjoying the new album, Obviously, by Lake Street Dive. I think, though, that if I heard this album when I was a kid I would have hated it. My music tastes have broadened considerably since then.
\n", "date_published": "2021-03-30T22:26:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/03/30/im-enjoying-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/03/25/canadas-country-ive.html", "content_html": "šµ āCanadaās Countryā: Iāve been enjoying this laid-back playlist while I work. Honestly, I didnāt know Canada made country music. Unfortunately, thereās nothing particularly Canadian about it. It would be cool if there were.
\n", "date_published": "2021-03-25T09:46:58-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/03/25/canadas-country-ive.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/03/19/im-currently-listening.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām currently listening to Chemtrails over the Country Club by Lana Del Ray for the first time. I have been waiting for this one. Lana Del Ray is one of my favorite artists. Itās too soon for me to tell how much I like it.
\n", "date_published": "2021-03-19T14:03:55-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/03/19/im-currently-listening.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/03/16/the-hold-steadys.html", "content_html": "šµ The Hold Steadyās latest album, Open Door Policy, is growing on me. I know reviewers love it, because it is a return to form, but I was hoping for something different. Itās hard to say, what, though. Something thatās a mix of fun and depressing, like my favorite Hold Steady lyrics, I guess.
\n", "date_published": "2021-03-16T23:37:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/03/16/the-hold-steadys.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/03/09/102609.html", "content_html": "šµ I loved all of the āPlaylists from Visionary Womenā that were front-and-center on Apple Music for International Womenās Day today. Iām glad they are still there today on the āBrowseā page.
\n", "date_published": "2021-03-09T11:26:09-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/03/09/102609.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2021/01/11/im-trying-out.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām trying out PlexAmp again, and am listening to Herbie Hancockās āGershwinās Worldā (in ALAC) which has been in my library for over twenty years and probably hasnāt been listened to since 2000.
\n", "date_published": "2021-01-11T14:29:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2021/01/11/im-trying-out.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/12/07/todays-listen-everything.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Everything Will Change” by The Postal Service. It’s the remastered audio part of a filmed concert from 2013. Sadly, it isn’t new music, but it’s fun to hear the band play live.
\n", "date_published": "2020-12-07T17:51:48-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/12/07/todays-listen-everything.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/12/04/todays-listen-my.html", "content_html": "šµ Todayās listen: āMy Womanā by Angel Olsen. I am a huge fan of her newer album, āAll Mirrorsā, so I decided to listen to her prior album. Itās pretty good, and has a strong finish, but it is not as compelling to me as āAll Mirrorsā is.
\n", "date_published": "2020-12-04T11:38:28-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/12/04/todays-listen-my.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/12/01/some-good-news.html", "content_html": "šµ Some good news for fans like me: The Hold Steady Announce New Album, Share New Song.
\n", "date_published": "2020-12-01T16:46:19-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/12/01/some-good-news.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/11/30/i-found-a.html", "content_html": "šµ I found a new Bleachers single today, featuring Bruce Springsteen. I was hoping for a new album this year, but this will have to do for now.
\n", "date_published": "2020-11-30T12:23:27-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/11/30/i-found-a.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/11/06/todays-listen-all.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “All Mirrors” by Angel Olsen. I love this album. It has the sort of sound that transports you to other, weird, wonderful places. The opening track reminds me, oddly, of early Bjƶrk and The Velvet Underground, and is yet completely its own thing.
\n", "date_published": "2020-11-06T09:57:51-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/11/06/todays-listen-all.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/11/04/my-mood-improves.html", "content_html": "My mood improves when I am near my headphones and my music collection. They have gotten me through this evening and last.
\n", "date_published": "2020-11-04T22:18:04-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/11/04/my-mood-improves.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/10/23/todays-listen-new.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “New Adventures in Hi-Fi” by R.E.M. I kind of forgot about this album, and haven’t listened to it in years. I knew it was a “road record,” but I never knew before today that a lot of the songs were recorded in stadiums, at sound checks, before R.E.M.’s live shows.
\n", "date_published": "2020-10-23T17:00:04-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/10/23/todays-listen-new.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/10/23/a-new-bruce.html", "content_html": "šµ A new Bruce Springsteen album is always welcome. I can’t get over how he keeps putting out good music. One thing I learned about him, from an alumni event (long ago) with his onetime producer, Jon Landau, is that Springsteen was not able to write dozens and dozens of songs and pick the best for his albums. He wrote relatively small numbers of good (and sometimes great) songs. That makes it all the more impressive to me that he has been releasing new material so regularly, and the quality is still high.
\n", "date_published": "2020-10-23T10:31:49-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/10/23/a-new-bruce.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/10/05/im-listening-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m listening to Ben Kweller and flashing back to the early aughts.
\n", "date_published": "2020-10-05T09:23:29-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/10/05/im-listening-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/09/14/i-am-very.html", "content_html": "šµ I am very late to the “lofi hip hop radio - beats to relax/study to” craze, but I am enjoying it. For convenience, rather than than streaming YouTube all day, I am just plugging that phrase into this search box in Apple Music, which has numerous playlists (like this one) in that genre.
\n", "date_published": "2020-09-14T09:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/09/14/i-am-very.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/09/11/my-favorite-internet.html", "content_html": "My favorite internet search thus far today was: “calming music that is not annoying.” All it turned up was YouTube videos, which I wasn’t really after.
\n", "date_published": "2020-09-11T09:55:46-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/09/11/my-favorite-internet.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/08/30/todays-listen-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “The Third Gleam” by The Avett Brothers. I had no idea this album existed and am thrilled it does. It is more lovely music from one of my favorite bands.
\n", "date_published": "2020-08-30T22:56:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/08/30/todays-listen-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/08/19/todays-listen-gimme.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Gimme Fiction” by Spoon. I remember not liking this record as much as Spoon’s earlier work, but whatever criticisms I have had of it are long forgotten. It is great.
\n", "date_published": "2020-08-19T13:53:47-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/08/19/todays-listen-gimme.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/08/18/theres-a-new.html", "content_html": "šµ There’s a new EP by Norah Jones.
\n", "date_published": "2020-08-18T16:37:52-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/08/18/theres-a-new.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/27/orville-peck-has.html", "content_html": "šµ Orville Peck has a really cool voice.
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-27T21:42:54-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/27/orville-peck-has.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/27/my-speakers-and.html", "content_html": "š§ My speakers and headphones sound so clear and exciting again now that I’ve got my equipment stack up and running again!\n
My favorite piece of Schiit came back to me in the mail today. Now that my Magni 3 Heresy is repaired, it is as good as new.\n![\"C9E53635-247A-4998-908F-CC56149E6F2F.jpg\"](\"https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/2098/2020/6248d5e9b1.jpg\")
Hmm…I don’t mind them myself, but I think the swears on Taylor Swift’s new album might be too much to expose my 8-year-old daughterāour family’s resident Taylor Swift fanā to. I don’t mind the f-bombs in “Hamilton,” but the meaning there is different.
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-24T12:16:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/24/hmmi-dont-mind.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Journal"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/24/my-daughter-is.html", "content_html": "My daughter is going to freak out when I tell her that a surprise Taylor Swift album dropped today. It’s getting rave reviews.
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-24T09:34:26-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/24/my-daughter-is.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Journal"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/20/i-am-really.html", "content_html": "šµ I am really enjoying the new album by “The Chicks”. That band wasn’t on my radar for a long, long time until the recent news that they changed their name.
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-20T10:02:22-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/20/i-am-really.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/09/im-trying-something.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m trying something different tonight: a K-Pop playlist of BLACKPINK. I think I like it. At times, my brain certainly is getting scrambled. š
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-09T22:49:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/09/im-trying-something.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/07/01/well-my-schiit.html", "content_html": "Well, my Schiit Magni Heresy just got fried. š¢ While listening to it over headphones, it made a popping sound, then started humming and crackling loudly. I hope Schiit honors their warranty, because I loved that thing. I use it as a headphone amp and a preamp for my desktop speakers, the latter of which have just been rendered useless.
\n", "date_published": "2020-07-01T15:12:19-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/07/01/well-my-schiit.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/06/08/i-have-been.html", "content_html": "šµ I have been enjoying the Breaking Singer/Songwriter playlist on Apple Music quite a bit today.
\n", "date_published": "2020-06-08T17:15:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/06/08/i-have-been.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/06/07/maniacs.html", "title": "šµ 10,000 Maniacs", "content_html": "\u0010Tonight I’m taking a trip down memory lane with 10,000 Maniacs.
\n“MTV Unpluggedā was a huge hit from 1993, when I was a sophomore in high school. Back then, I listened to \u0010ā\u0010In My Tribeā and āOur Time In Edenā (my favorite 10,000 Maniacs record) back-to-back all the time.
\nAnother live performance, from 1998, was just released a couple days ago, too.
\n", "date_published": "2020-06-07T21:28:11-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/06/07/maniacs.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/04/06/i-am-enjoying.html", "content_html": "šµ I am enjoying “Future Nostalga” by Dua Lipa.
\n", "date_published": "2020-04-06T21:20:37-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/04/06/i-am-enjoying.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/03/02/todays-listen-i.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “I Miss Britpop.” So do I, Apple Music, so do I.
\n", "date_published": "2020-03-02T16:00:07-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/03/02/todays-listen-i.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/24/todays-listen-a.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships” by The 1975. I must be crazy because I did not like this album earlier (I thought it was wildly overrated), but I just had to listen to “Love It If We Made It” today, and the rest of the album came along with it. š¤·āāļø
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-24T16:11:50-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/24/todays-listen-a.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/19/todays-listen-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: The “Andrew Bird Essentials” playlist on Apple Music. I don’t know Andrew Bird’s music too well, but I’m really enjoying it so far.
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-19T15:45:33-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/19/todays-listen-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/18/todays-listen-honeymoon.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Honeymoon” by Beach Bunny. I’m a big fan of the lead single, from way last year: “Dream Boy”. The rest of the album, which I’ve been waiting a long time for, is a fun listen. I love lead singer/bandleader Lili Trifilio’s balance of insecurity and poise in her both her lyrics and performance.
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-18T22:37:16-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/18/todays-listen-honeymoon.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/07/i-like-the.html", "content_html": "šµ I like the new Nada Surf album.
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-07T22:09:18-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/07/i-like-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/07/todays-listen-out.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Out of Time” by R.E.M. This is one of the foundational albums in my music collection. It’s 10th track, “Country Feedback,” is R.E.M.’s best song, in my opinion (and in Michael Stipe’s).
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-07T16:43:54-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/07/todays-listen-out.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/05/i-havent-been.html", "content_html": "š§ I haven’t been listening to all my awesome headphones nearly as much for the past week, because of some tinnitus-related problems (which I have discovered may not have anything to do with noise exposure). It’s uncanny how weird they sound all of the sudden.
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-05T23:40:04-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/05/i-havent-been.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/02/04/todays-listen-old.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Old Dominion” (2019) by Old Dominion. This is a pleasant country album with great playing and production. None of the songs really grabbed me, but I enjoyed the album nonetheless. It’s the sort of music I like to have on but not really listen too closely to.
\n", "date_published": "2020-02-04T14:41:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/02/04/todays-listen-old.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/28/todays-listen-westworld.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “WestWorld: Season 2 (Music from the HBO Series)” by Ramin Djawadi. I am getting psyched for season 3, which starts in March. Season 2 had some awesome atmospheric music as well as cool covers of “Runaway”, “Heart Shaped Box” (I like the piano one best), and “Seven Nation Army”.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-28T21:49:50-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/28/todays-listen-westworld.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/27/todays-listen-manic.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Manic” by Halsey. Overall, I like it. But, after one listen, I don’t have a strong opinion about it or any track on it. I’ll give it another shot later this week.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-27T23:37:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/27/todays-listen-manic.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/20/todays-listen-kiwanuka.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Kiwanuka” by Michael Kiwanuka. With its mix of soul, Afrobeat, and psychedelia, it sounds timeless, or, maybe, somehow plucked out of time and brought forward about forty years to now.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-20T15:07:58-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/20/todays-listen-kiwanuka.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/20/gotta-get-up.html", "title": "šµ \"Gotta Get Up\" in \"Russion Doll\"", "content_html": "I was thinking of “Russian Doll” and put on “Gotta Get Up” by Harry Nillson. Curious about the song, I looked it up on Wikipedia.
\nFrom Wikipedia:
\n\n\nIn 2019, “Gotta Get Up” was prominently featured as the “reset” song in the Netflix series Russian Doll. The song plays each time the seriesā protagonist Nadia (co-creator Natasha Lyonne) dies and returns to the same location ā a bathroom at her 36th birthday party. Its use is similar to that of Sonny & Cher’s “I Got You Babe” from the 1993 film Groundhog Day. Lyonne explained that in choosing the song she was struck by the “buoyant doomsday quality” of Nilsson’s life. The cost of using the song so many times took up a significant portion of the music budget. His estate also limited how many times the song could be used.
\n
Reading this got me thinking about what nonsense music rights are for TV and movies. Why are song rights so expensive? Moreover, why should Nillson’s estate be able to limit “how many times the songs could be used? (Harry Nilsson died in 1994.) That sounds so frustrating to deal with. I don’t understand why more TV producers don’t just hire musicians to record cover versions and cut out, at the very least, the performance royalties. (I know this sometimes happens. I’m surprised it doesn’t happen more.)
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-20T11:37:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/20/gotta-get-up.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/17/todays-listen-free.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Free Yourself Up” by Lake Street Dive, which is a fun, Boston-based, blue-eyed-soul group. My favorite track on this album is “Good Kisser”, which is what I mainly choose listen to when building a playlist, but the whole record is worth a listen.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-17T17:41:37-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/17/todays-listen-free.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/16/todays-listen-love.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “69 Love Songs” by The Magnetic Fields. This is an amazing triple album full of diverse, smart, and interesting songs-not just love songs, but songs about love, and even about love songs. There really are 69 songs, 23 per album, which make it almost a box set in and of itself.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-16T10:37:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/16/todays-listen-love.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/15/todays-listen-immunity.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “Immunity” by Clairo. It’s studio-produced lounge pop from a lo-fi bedroom pop YouTube sensation. “Sofia” is my favorite song on it. It reminds me a lot of my old “Blonde Redhead” albums.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-15T15:53:51-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/15/todays-listen-immunity.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/14/todays-album-heard.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album: “Heard it in a Past Life” by Maggie Rogers. It’s a decent pop album and I really like her voice, but overall it wasn’t a terribly interesting listen for me.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-14T15:24:05-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/14/todays-album-heard.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/13/todays-listen-by.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: “1989” by Ryan Adams. It’s a melancholy, largely acoustic cover of Taylor Swift’s massively more famous album of the same name. I think reinterpreting these songs was a great idea, but I prefer the big, studio sound of the original album.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-13T17:42:35-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/13/todays-listen-by.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/09/todays-listen-reveal.html", "title": "šµ Today's listen: [\"Reveal\" by R.E.M.](https://music.apple.com/us/album/reveal/1445846667)", "content_html": "This album is probably known as one of R.E.M.’s lesser efforts. When it came out in 2001, I didn’t like it. Compared to R.E.M.’s earlier work, it felt pat and drowsy. The mid-tempo arrangements lacked insistence and energy, and all the studio sound effects felt unnatural and unmusical to me at the time. I played it once and didn’t listen to it any more.
\nA few years later, one of my friends said, offhandedly, after “All the Way to Reno (Our’s Gonna be a Star)” came on the radio, that he absolutely loved the album. I got to hear it through new ears, and came to love how good it sounds, and to think of the songs as dark, late night, chill-out rock, whose arrangements and instrumentation move between spareness to lushness in interesting ways.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-09T14:58:20-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/09/todays-listen-reveal.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/08/todays-album-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album: “The King is Dead” by The Decemberists. It’s acoustic, Americana-inspired, and is one of the best produced, best sounding albums in my collection. The sound is so warm and the melodies so gentle that it’s easy to forget the album’s themes of death and rebirth.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-08T14:59:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/08/todays-album-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/07/todays-album-cut.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album, “Cut & Stitch” by Petrol Girls. It’s fun, furious, feminist punk rock, peppered with rage, teeming with energy, tinged with emotion, and full of interesting and varied soundscapes.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-07T11:13:25-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/07/todays-album-cut.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/06/todays-album-diatom.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album: “Diatom Ribbons” by Kris Davis
\nKris Davis is a jazz pianist, composer, and bandleader. The New York Times crowned “Diatom Ribbons” as the #1 jazz album of 2019:
\n\n\nKris Davis, 39, has spent years as her generationās powerhouse pianist in waiting. No longer. On āDiatom Ribbons,ā her skills as a composer, band assembler, system builder and improviser ā a musical auteur, basically ā come fully into focus. Ms. Davis builds her compositions on crooked patterns and splintered loops that somehow become a kind of magnetic touchstone, bringing together wildly diverse musicians in tangled unity.
\n
I don’t listen to jazz that much anymore but I used to listen to it for hours on end as I read and wrote my way through my senior year of college. (It helped that I could get countless jazz CDs for free at the library.) “Diatom Ribbons” is more edgy and experimental than the classic jazz I grew up on, but I found it quite enjoyable. Listening to it is like visiting a musical world I kind of understand, and kind of don’t, but feeling warm and welcome all the same.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-06T17:07:39-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/06/todays-album-diatom.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/03/dont-mind-me.html", "content_html": "š¤« Don’t mind me, I’m just testing new š§ today. šµššµ
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-03T18:00:32-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/03/dont-mind-me.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/03/in-lieu-of.html", "content_html": "šµ In lieu of music this morning, I’m listening to the folks at The Incomparable overanalyze The Rise of Skywalker. It’s fun to listen to, especially because the last two Star Wars movies were so divisive. It will be fun to hear Gruber’s take on “The Talk Show” someday.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-03T11:32:53-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/03/in-lieu-of.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/02/todays-album-two.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album: “Two Hands” by Big Thief. I saw this album on the top of Bob Boilen’s top ten albums of 2019 list. I liked it a lot more than I liked UFOF, but I don’t think this band speaks to me. I probably will revisit the first half of this album sometime, but that’s about it.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-02T13:13:49-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/02/todays-album-two.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/02/does-tremolo-that.html", "content_html": "š§ Does tremolo that ping-pongs between the left and right channels bother everybody who listens through headphones, or is it just me? It literally makes me feel seasick. š¤¢
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-02T11:56:19-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/02/does-tremolo-that.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2020/01/02/i-cant-decide.html", "content_html": "šµ I can’t decide on an album to listen to this morning. I wish there was a playlist for “how do I start the work week on a Thursday after nearly two weeks off?” I guess Jason Snell’s 2019 Selections playlist will do for now.
\n", "date_published": "2020-01-02T09:45:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2020/01/02/i-cant-decide.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/20/album-of-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Album of the day: Better Oblivion Community Center’s eponymous debut. B.O.C.C. is the duo of Phoebe Bridgers and Conor Oberst. I’m only familiar with Conor Oberst, and I think this album fits in very well with the rest of his work. It is quiet, moody indie rock. The songs are beautiful and the production sounds good.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-20T10:32:34-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/20/album-of-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/19/album-of-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Album of the Day: “Designer” by Aldous Harding. It is a quiet, intimate, folksy album that reminded me a little of Hope Sandoval from Mazzy Star.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-19T15:26:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/19/album-of-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/18/album-of-the.html", "content_html": "šµ Album of the day: “U.F.O.F.” by Big Thief. I found it on several “best of 2019” lists. It’s a quiet folk-rock album, with ruminative lyrics and a sound that borders on dream pop in places. I’m not sure if it really speaks to me, though.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-18T10:51:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/18/album-of-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/17/todays-album-so.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s album: “So” by Peter Gabriel. It’s a masterpiece. I kind of forgot that, and had not listened to it in several years. I barely know what else to say.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-17T11:20:09-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/17/todays-album-so.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/13/todays-listen-hawksley.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: Hawksley Workman’s “For Him and the Girls”. The songwriting is strong and eclectic, some of the hooks are really catchy, and he played all the instruments and recorded it himself. The top track for me is “No Sissies” though I’m not sure how well its title has aged.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-13T10:02:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/13/todays-listen-hawksley.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/04/obladi-oblada.html", "title": "šµ Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da", "content_html": "Today I learned that the Beatles' “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” is widely reviled. From the Wikipedia article:
\n\n\n“Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” is often the subject of ridicule. In 2004, it was included in Blender magazine’s list titled “50 Worst Songs Ever!"[61] and was voted the worst song of all time in an online poll organised by Mars.[62] In 2012, the NME’s website editor, Luke Lewis, argued that the Beatles had recorded “a surprising amount of ropy old toss”, and singled out “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” as “the least convincing cod-reggae skanking this side of the QI theme tune”. That same year, Tom Rowley of The Daily Telegraph said the track was a “reasonable choice” for derision, following the result of the Mars poll, and it subsequently came second (behind “Revolution 9”) in the Telegraph’s poll to determine the worst Beatles song.
\n
I always liked that song, and never thought of it as anything other than a light, fun song that is supposed to beābig shock hereālight and fun. I’m more apt to be critical of art that takes itself too seriously.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-04T23:35:32-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/04/obladi-oblada.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/04/im-changing-pace.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m changing pace today with a classic rock album: “The Kids are Alright” by The Who. I’m very familiar with some of the tracks, of course, but I don’t think I’ve ever listened to this album.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-04T11:24:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/04/im-changing-pace.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/04/im-taking-the.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m taking the “COMPLEX Best Alternative R&B Artists” playlist on Apple Music out for a spin today.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-04T09:33:17-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/04/im-taking-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/03/house-music-which.html", "content_html": "šµ House music, which is not normally my thing, sounds much more exciting with my more bass-heavy V-Moda headphones. š§
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-03T23:49:21-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/03/house-music-which.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/12/02/green-by-rem.html", "title": "šµ Green, by R.E.M.", "content_html": "I spent most of my workday listening to music today, and really enjoyed it. One album I revisited, thanks to a remaster and, basically, nostalgia, was “Green” by R.E.M. Green was my first R.E.M. album, which I got when I was in middle school. (I don’t remember how I learned about them. I know it wasn’t from hearing “Stand”. It was probably from browsing “Rolling Stone” in a bookstore.)
\nNow, instead of reading liner notes while I listen to an album, I surf the web for album reviews to read instead. The best “Green” review I found today was by Andrezj Lukowski on Drowned in Sound:
\n\n\nGreen is the end of something and the beginning of something else and the continuation of something greater, but rather than get lost in grand narratives, maybe letās focus on what it sounds like.
\nFor the most part, Green sounds like innocence, a sense of youth and light and simplicity and clumsiness and play that had not been in the band’s makeup when they burst out of the Georgian murk with the Chronic Town and Murmur.
\n
I don’t really know what the changes the remaster did to the album. It may have just made everything louder. Whatever the improvements were, the album sounded great on my super nice headphones. Of course, when I was a kid, listening to “Green” on repeat in my bedroom, I had real, but very cheap, speakers, so the experience isn’t exactly comparable.
\nOn other R.E.M. album remasters, I have found that I can understand every one of Michael Stipe’s elliptical, nonsense lyrics on R.E.M.’s oldest songs, and that isn’t always a good thing. By the time R.E.M. made “Green”, Michael Stipe’s lyrics were a lot more straightforward, and his singing was clear and up front in the mix.
\nAnyway, “Green” was and is still great. It was fun to revisit it today.
\n", "date_published": "2019-12-02T23:23:05-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/12/02/green-by-rem.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/11/25/airplay-and-an.html", "title": "AirPlay and an audiophile DAC/Amp on Ubuntu", "content_html": "I did a little audio geekery this evening. I set up shairport-sync on the little Ubuntu server that sits toward the back of my desk, so that I can AirPlay to it from all my iOS devices. AirPlay is great because it transmits audio over WiFi with no quality degredation, and AirPlay devices are always listed in iOS, unlike BlueTooth speakers, which have to be connected to. Next, I configured PulseAudio to automatically switch to my headphone DAC/Amp when I turn it on. (My DAC/amp is a portable one with an internal battery, so I can’t leave it plugged in all the time.) So far, so good with the new setup! By far the hardest part of the setup was searching online for the correct instructions to type into the terminal. I was happy to learn that shairport-sync is now in Ubuntu’s repositories, but I think that things like this need to be easier to discover, and possible to install, in the GUI.
\n", "date_published": "2019-11-25T23:25:20-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/11/25/airplay-and-an.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Tech"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/11/23/i-am-enjoying.html", "content_html": "šµ I am enjoying the album “All Mirrors” by Angel Olsen.
\n", "date_published": "2019-11-23T11:05:40-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/11/23/i-am-enjoying.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/11/21/i-love-dream.html", "content_html": "šµ I love “Dream Boy” by Beach Bunny. It’s such a fun song, and everything about it is great, from the lyric to the vulnerable vocals to the production. I wish it had been around when I was younger and listened to a lot more power pop and emoāit would have fit right in.
\n", "date_published": "2019-11-21T14:13:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/11/21/i-love-dream.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/30/rems-monster-is.html", "content_html": "šµ R.E.M.’s Monster is an underrated album, though it certainly is very much of its moment (the mid 1990s).
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-30T08:53:56-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/30/rems-monster-is.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/29/peter-buck-and.html", "content_html": "šµ Peter Buck and Mike Mills (of R.E.M. fame) are in a supergroup that only performs original songs about baseball. The world is a weird and wonderful place.
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-29T18:04:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/29/peter-buck-and.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/24/i-have-been.html", "content_html": "šµ I have been listening to all the singles and EPs from Us the Duo while working the past couple hours. Their recordings all sound great and are relaxing, but not too relaxing, sounds to work to. (I think some of the songs are covers, but I’m not sure.)
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-24T08:57:21-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/24/i-have-been.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/16/theres-a-new.html", "content_html": "šµ There’s a new, remastered version of “Jollification” by The Lightning Seeds out now.
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-16T14:05:41-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/16/theres-a-new.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/08/how-did-i.html", "content_html": "šµ How did I not know there was a new Avett Brother’s album?
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-08T16:02:53-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/08/how-did-i.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/10/01/i-discovered-new.html", "content_html": "šµ I discovered new albums by “The New Pornographers” and “Belle & Sebastian” today. They totally made my day.
\n", "date_published": "2019-10-01T22:01:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/10/01/i-discovered-new.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/09/17/amazon-music-hd.html", "title": "šµ Amazon Music HD", "content_html": "I have the premium headphones and DACs that would make Amazon Music HD, it’s new hidef tier, worthwhile for me. But…I really don’t want to subscribe to anything other than Apple Music, due in large part to Apple Music’s integration with all my Apple hardware, which makes life easier for me and every member of my family. Also, I do not like how Amazon’s Prime Video app looks or works so much, and don’t want to invite that kind of friction in my music listening experience. I do applaud their direction into higher quality streaming, though.
\n", "date_published": "2019-09-17T11:04:26-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/09/17/amazon-music-hd.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/09/06/try-to-remember.html", "title": "šµ Try to Remember", "content_html": "I love the richness of Jerry Orbach’s baritone on this recording of “Try to Remember” from The Fantasticks. The lyrics are simple, deep, and beautiful, too.
\n\n\nTry to remember the kind of September / when you were a tender and callow fellow
\n
I like to put this song on repeat when September begins. It’s the sort of song that moves into my psyche and stays with me for a long time.
\n", "date_published": "2019-09-06T16:39:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/09/06/try-to-remember.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/08/30/i-am-very.html", "content_html": "šµ I am very much enjoying NPR’s New Music Friday playlist today. It helps to have two Lana Del Ray tracks and one from TOOL on the list.
\n", "date_published": "2019-08-30T11:25:22-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/08/30/i-am-very.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/08/29/i-am-immune.html", "content_html": "šµ I am immune to the charms of “Baby Shark.”
\n", "date_published": "2019-08-29T17:12:47-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/08/29/i-am-immune.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/08/02/the-new-pornographers.html", "content_html": "šµ The New Pornographers are releasing a new album on September 27 (via Jazz Monroe of Pitchfork). I love this band, and I love the music of one of their members, Neko Case, even more.
\n", "date_published": "2019-08-02T18:39:20-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/08/02/the-new-pornographers.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/07/26/its-a-bright.html", "content_html": "šµ It’s a bright and cheery “Country Caffeine” afternoon for me, as I close out my work week.
\n", "date_published": "2019-07-26T15:02:43-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/07/26/its-a-bright.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/06/17/i-was-happy.html", "content_html": "šµ I was happy to discover today that NPR has added curated playlists to Apple Music. It will be another, alternative source of new music recommendations for me.
\n", "date_published": "2019-06-17T15:14:34-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/06/17/i-was-happy.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/06/10/somehow-i-made.html", "content_html": "šµ Somehow I made it from Beats 1 to Robyn Hitchcock’s “Chronology”, which is a fun listen but very far afield from the hip-hop I started the day with.
\n", "date_published": "2019-06-10T14:40:31-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/06/10/somehow-i-made.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/06/10/its-a-beats.html", "content_html": "šµ It’s a Beats 1 morning for me. I don’t often listen to Beats 1, but today I had no idea what to listen to while I worked.
\n", "date_published": "2019-06-10T09:45:49-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/06/10/its-a-beats.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/06/07/texas-is-a.html", "content_html": "šµ Texas 25 is a great pop (ahem, blue-eyed soul) album. The band reworked eight of their hits, and added four new songs, to celebrate their 25th anniversary.
\n", "date_published": "2019-06-07T16:04:12-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/06/07/texas-is-a.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/06/06/whats-up-danger.html", "content_html": "šµ “What’s Up Danger?” by Blackway and Black Caviar. (I’m starting my day in the Spider-Verse.)
\n", "date_published": "2019-06-06T08:26:16-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/06/06/whats-up-danger.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/05/06/im-listening-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m listening to Aja on my V-Moda Crossfade 2 š§ tonight. Steely Dan isn’t always my thing, but their records sound so good.
\n", "date_published": "2019-05-06T22:50:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/05/06/im-listening-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/05/04/i-never-get.html", "content_html": "šµ I never get sick of Lana Del Ray, especially when a song of hers shows up in my “Chill Mix”.
\n", "date_published": "2019-05-04T20:29:42-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/05/04/i-never-get.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/04/30/hadestown.html", "title": "Hadestown", "content_html": "šµ I’m giving “Hadestown” a first listen tonight. I never heard of the show until today’s Tony award nominations.\n\n, which surprised me, because I try to keep track of all the Broadway musicals. I thought that this was another very weak year for new musicals, so I am happy to learn of a completely new one. I hope that it is a new classic. I’m not sure, though, how closely the “Hadestownā on Apple Music resembles the Broadway version; I read that the show went through a bunch of changes over the years.
\n", "date_published": "2019-04-30T22:38:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/04/30/hadestown.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/04/18/nancy-wilson-who.html", "content_html": "šµ Nancy Wilson, who I have known about forever but have never really listened to, is awesome.
\n", "date_published": "2019-04-18T15:04:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/04/18/nancy-wilson-who.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/04/11/temporary-by-feathermerchants.html", "content_html": "šµ Temporary, by Feathermerchants
\n", "date_published": "2019-04-11T23:05:16-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/04/11/temporary-by-feathermerchants.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/04/05/the-new-sara.html", "content_html": "šµ The new Sara Bareilles album is really good.
\n", "date_published": "2019-04-05T17:03:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/04/05/the-new-sara.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/02/07/while-ive-been.html", "content_html": "šµ While I’ve been working this morning, I have been listening to Apple Music’s “Vibes” playlist on my big Marshall Bluetooth speaker (no headphones for a change). It’s good working music: laid back, but not too slow, varied, and modern.
\n", "date_published": "2019-02-07T12:04:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/02/07/while-ive-been.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/02/05/its-an-automatic.html", "content_html": "šµ It’s an “Automatic for the People” day for me. That amazing R.E.M. album has been the soundtrack to deep work for me since 1992. The 25th anniversary edition (man, I’m old!) has live tracks for most of the tracks, which makes it a fun listen.
\n", "date_published": "2019-02-05T12:54:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/02/05/its-an-automatic.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/01/20/one-of-the.html", "content_html": "šµ One of the joys of an “all you can eatā music subscription is that I never miss new albums by my old favorites. Case in point: Guster, who just dropped a new album,āLook Alive”. I’m giving it a listen now with my best setup.
\n", "date_published": "2019-01-19T23:33:59-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/01/19/one-of-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2019/01/10/i-am-a.html", "content_html": "šµ I am a sucker for reverb on a well-produced track. Case in point: āRill Rillā by Sleigh Bells.
\n", "date_published": "2019-01-10T17:05:09-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2019/01/10/i-am-a.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/12/11/im-relistening-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m re-listening to Adrian Legg’s “Guitars and Other Cathedrals” today. It’s a 1990 album that I “borrowed” from a friend in high school and never returned. Legg is an astonishing acoustic guitar player. This album is warm and laid back.
\n", "date_published": "2018-12-11T11:02:06-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/12/11/im-relistening-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/12/07/the-grammy-awards.html", "content_html": "šµ The Grammy Awards are really, really stupid. Still, you should listen to some Brandi Carlile, who was nominated for a bunch of them today.
\n", "date_published": "2018-12-07T16:03:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/12/07/the-grammy-awards.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/12/03/river-of-dreams.html", "title": "šµ River of Dreams", "content_html": "I’m not a huge Billy Joel fan, though I do have all his albums and respect him as an artist. I wish he had written another album after River of Dreams, which I am listening to again today. I think that, as a maker of albums, rather than singles, he hit his stride with Storm Front and that, as an album, River of Dreams is his best. His earlier albums have higher highs and lower lows, and don’t hold together as well, in my opinion. I prefer picking through his excellent Greatest Hits collections rather than revisit the albums the songs come from.
\n", "date_published": "2018-12-03T11:11:56-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/12/03/river-of-dreams.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/11/19/i-have-enjoyed.html", "content_html": "šµ I have enjoyed Regina Spektor’s Remember Us To Life for the past two years. Her evocative lyrics, expressive voice, and theatrical arrangements make this collection of songs loom large in my imagination.
\n", "date_published": "2018-11-19T11:54:21-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/11/19/i-have-enjoyed.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/11/07/im-listening-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m listening to a bunch of different versions of what is probably the greatest Bossa nova song ever: “Aguas de Marco"/"Waters of March”. It’s lovely and hypnotic.
\n", "date_published": "2018-11-07T11:56:43-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/11/07/im-listening-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/11/06/i-thought-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I thought to myself this morning: āWhy donāt I just play all my songs on shuffle?ā
\n", "date_published": "2018-11-06T10:47:28-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/11/06/i-thought-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/10/30/how-have-i.html", "content_html": "šµ How have I never listened to “The Last Waltz” before? I guess because I thought it would be sad to listen to the last concert by a band (The Band) I loved. It isn’t sad at all.
\n", "date_published": "2018-10-30T09:40:44-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/10/30/how-have-i.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/10/29/i-do-not.html", "content_html": "šµ I do not listen to nearly enough Neko Case. For the first time in forever, I just spun up her 2002 album, Blacklisted, with its electric lead track: “Things that Scare Me”.
\n", "date_published": "2018-10-29T15:36:53-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/10/29/i-do-not.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/10/29/151337.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m trying to listen to the Original Broadway Cast recording of “Pretty Woman: the Musical” and it is hard to get through. So boring, so trite. The cast is good, though. Andy Karl, in particular, needs to find a role in a show not based on a movie for a change.
\n", "date_published": "2018-10-29T11:13:37-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/10/29/151337.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/10/09/norah-jones-has.html", "content_html": "šµ Norah Jones has a new single out, which she wrote with Jeff Tweedy (who plays guitar on the track): A Song with No Name. It is bare, stark, and simple, like an old, sad country ballad.
\n", "date_published": "2018-10-09T10:40:10-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/10/09/norah-jones-has.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/09/07/todays-listen-fine.html", "content_html": "šµ Today’s listen: Fine Young Cannibals' The Raw and the Cooked on my V-Moda Crossfade 2 š§.
\n", "date_published": "2018-09-07T08:47:26-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/09/07/todays-listen-fine.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/09/05/i-dont-always.html", "content_html": "šµ I donāt always listen to āJosie and the Pussycatsā but when I do, itās Kay Hanley singing.
\n![](\"https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/2098/2018/dcf2ccab08.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-09-05T11:18:39-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/09/05/i-dont-always.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/27/vocal-jazz-with.html",
"title": "šµ Vocal Jazz with the V-Moda Crossfade Wireless 2",
"content_html": "Today felt like a good day to listen to a long vocal jazz playlist through my V Moda Crossfade Wireless 2. Their warm, somewhat bass-y sound signature works surprisingly well for that genre. I mostly think of them as great for rock and pop music, but they handled sparse arrangements of vocals (male and female), piano, bass, and drums (mostly brushwork) surprisingly well.
\nI had to use wired mode because the Bluetooth connection is too loud for me, even at the lowest volume setting, on my iOS devices. The Bluetooth volume level appears to be more sane when I use them with my Apple TV or Mac.
\n![](\"https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/2098/2018/71ecbf0d75.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-08-27T14:17:01-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/27/vocal-jazz-with.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/17/altec-lansing-m.html",
"title": "Altec Lansing M650 iPod Speaker Dock",
"content_html": "After enjoying the Philips Revolution speaker dock for a while, I started to look for a better sounding iPod dock. I found that in the Altec Lansing M650, which is a 2.1 channel system (yes, stereo speakers plus a tiny, down-firing subwoofer!) in a compact, triangular case, with a 30-pin iPod/iPhone dock on a ledge in front.
\nI thought, and still think, that it sounds great. Its sound is warm, rich, and natural. While I wouldnāt consider the bass response to be very tight, or there to be any stereo separation at all, it does sound really nice, and can fill a small bedroom or a home office with a pleasant sound that I could listen to for hours on end.
\nI used one as my main desktop stereo system for a couple years while I worked from home. It replaced my Harmon Kardon Soundsticks, which sounded better for music, but were not as easy to connect to my iPhone. It sounds great for music, podcasts, and for TVāthanks to its line-in jack, I often plugged an iPad into it for better audio when watching baseball or Netflix. I liked this speaker so much that I bought another one for the kitchen, where it was a great base station for phone charging and playing internet radio for several years.
\nUnfortunately, while this speaker sounds great, its 30-pin dock is poorly implemented. After several months, both speakers emit annoying static from the 30-pin connector unless the iPhone is seated just right. I think Iām the only one in my house who knows how to fiddle with it until the sound clears up. Plus, of course, the 30-pin connector was made obsolete by Appleās change to the Lightning standard.
\nI still use both of my M650s in my childrenās rooms to play white noise while they sleep, and occasional music while they are awake, through our old iPhone 4 and 4S. It has gotten increasingly difficult to seat an iPhone on them without getting static through the 30-pin connection, but it is still possible. However, because the 30-pin iPhones that drive them are old and barely work at this point (software-wise), these speakersā days as iPhone docks are numbered. They have a line-in jack in the back, however, and are prime candidates to pair with an Amazon Echo Dot (or something similar) sometime in the future.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-17T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/17/altec-lansing-m.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/16/philips-revolution-motorized.html", "title": "Philips Revolution Motorized Portable Speaker Dock for iPhone/iPod", "content_html": "The iPod had a monumental impact on how people listened to music. Not only did it turn people onto digital music downloads, rather than CDs, better than any preceding product; it also made listening to playlists and to shuffled music simple and extremely popular. The iPodās 30-pin connector had a huge impact on home speaker systems as well. Suddenly, it became the default connection option for a bevy of home speakers. In stores, many speaker systems were repealed by iPod speaker docks.
\nWhile I had iPods since the first iPod Mini was released, shortly after I got married, I got an iPod Touch. It came for for free with my wifeās first MacBook Pro, and she had no interest in it. Of course, as a non-iPhone-owner, I found the iPod Touch to be an incredible upgrade from my iPod Nano. Around the same time, I got my first iPod speaker dock for free as well, in exchange for writing a review. It was a Philips Revolution speaker dock that looked somewhat like a boombox, could be driven by a bunch of D-cells or a power cord, and had a rotating dock that could accommodate (in portrait or in landscape mode) every iPod created to date and the first generation iPhone.
\nFor sound, it was perfectly adequate. I liked it a lot at the time, but I thought of it like a boombox rather than a room-filling speaker system. It lacked a subwoofer, and thus had lackluster bass, but it was small, battery powered, and brought music into places in our apartment that it previously didnāt reach. My wife and I enjoyed using it with the iPod Touch for streaming musicāmainly Pandora or streaming radio from WNYCāin the dining room while we ate dinner. I really enjoyed using it for background music during meals or for news radio, for which having the richest and best audio quality was not terribly important.
\nIn the same way that my computer, once I got a CD-ROM drive, supplanted the stereo system as my main music player, this speaker system solidified the iPodās (and later the iPhoneās) prime position as the source for music in my house. It also got me into the habit of streaming audio into the house, rather than only playing previously downloaded (or ripped) music. My wife and I used it in our kitchen for years to stream WNYC news and music. When the iPhone changed from the 30-pin connector to the Lightning connector however, this speaker dockās days were numbered. And when that original iPod Touchās software support was dropped by Apple, this speaker dockās days were done.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-16T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/16/philips-revolution-motorized.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/15/harman-kardon-soundsticks.html", "title": "Harman Kardon Soundsticks II Speaker System", "content_html": "In my mid 20s, I decided to move from boring (but nice) suburban Connecticut back to the Boston area where I went to college. It was a chance to reinvent myself, which is something I really needed to do at the time.
\nIn the process, I replaced a lot of my belongingsācheap things or hand-me-downs that I had since my college daysāwith newer, better versions. I replaced nearly everything I cooked with and ate with: dishes, pots and pans, and small appliances. I bought a new wardrobe and got rid of my ratty old T-shirts and jeans. I traded up from a slow and struggling Dell tower PC to a sleek, fast, white MacBook (my first Mac!). I also traded up from my old, busted Altec Lansing computer speakers to the cool, futuristic Harman Kardon Soundsticks II that I saw in the Apple Store.
\nThe Soundsticksā clear plastic construction made them almost invisible. Their clear, light-up subwoofer looked like a bioluminescent jellyfish floating atop the tangle of wires under my desk. Their capacitive touch volume control was futuristic, too, but really hard to control; I mainly relied on my MacBookās volume control instead.
\nIn my cool, urban apartment, I played music through these cool, stylish speakers for hours and hours each day as I worked on my new MacBook (and on my work laptop, side-by-side). They sounded much better than my prior Altec Lansing computer speakers, but mostly they just looked better. I found that, at loud volumes, they didnāt really fill the room how I would have liked them, but I rarely played them that loud anyway, considering they were sitting on the desk I was working at.
\nDuring this time, I stopped buying CDs and started buying music online. I got into indie rock very heavily, mainly because I could get their tracks at great prices (25 cents per track) though eMusic. I first heard Okkervil River, Spoon, The Avett Brothers, The Apples in Stereo, Bright Eyes, Rilo Kily, Rainer Maria, and many, many other artists through these speakers.
\nI happily used these speakers for five years or soāeven after moving from my hip, urban apartment to the suburban house I live in nowābut I eventually tired of the mess their wires made atop and beneath my desk, and moved them into basement storage. Someday I hope to find another use for them, perhaps as a bookshelf system driven by a Raspberry Pi, but I would need to figure out a way to hide all the wires, so the great looks of these speakers shine through.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-15T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/15/harman-kardon-soundsticks.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/14/altec-lansing-computer.html", "title": "Altec Lansing Computer Speakers", "content_html": "Over winter break, during my sophomore year in college, I bought my first new computer: a beige Dell tower with an Intel 486 processor. When pricing out systemsāand this was done over the phone back then, rather than over the internet, because my parents did not have internet access in 1997āI configured nearly identical systems from Gateway and Dell at the same price. The only difference between them was in the peripherals: the Gateway came with a 19-inch monitor, rather than a 17-inch monitor, and the Dell came with a USB-connected, 2.1 channel Altec Lansing speaker setup. I bought the Dell, to get the better speakers.
\nAt the time, I thought the trade-off was completely worth it. The speakers were tiny, stylish, had some fancy USB connectivity (USB was brand new then!), and came with a subwoofer, which I had never had before. The subwoofer added a new dimension to my music that I had never experienced before. It could shake the room if I wanted that, or just add some sub-bass dimension to the music. Its presence inspired me to pair this speaker set with my old, 2-channel Altec Lansing computer speakers, to create a 4.1 channel setup that I used to watch DVDs in my dorm room in 1999 and 2000. I had to upgrade my sound card to a Sound Blaster Audigy to get that to work. (I think that is the last dedicated sound card I ever bought!)
\nTheir USB connection was not all I had hoped for, however. It did not carry the audio signal; it only allowed you to control the volume and EQ from a Windows menu bar application. It was pretty sophisticated for the time, but it was superfluous, and, I discovered after a year or so, the drivers that made it work caused Windows to crash all the time. So I disabled the USB feature and continued to use them for about 10 years, through college, grad school, and beyond. Eventually they wore out so badly they could no longer play at a proper volume. By that point, though, I had moved onto using an iPod for most of my music playback.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-14T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/14/altec-lansing-computer.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/13/my-first-computer.html", "title": "My first computer speakers", "content_html": "I got my first computer when I was in seventh grade. It was an IBM AT/XT that we upgraded several times over the years. By the time I was in high school, my dad bought me a SoundBlaster sound card and some 6-inch computer speakers. I actually do not remember who made them: it was either JBL, Creative, or Altec Lansing. What I do remember is that they were the generic beige color of all PC hardware of the era, the right speaker had knobs for balance and volume, and, as a pair, they could go very, very loud. No one else I came across had computer speakers that large or that loud.
\nSound quality-wise, however, they were not great. Back then, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, it was still rare to hear any sounds at all coming out of a computer. It was enough to be able to hear the beeps and blips coming from my DOS-based productivity software and games.
\nDue to lackluster sound quality, and the fact that CD-ROM drives were too expensive for me to buy until the mid 1990s, these computer speakers never replaced my CD systemās speakers as my main playback system. They are important to me, however, because they enabled me, for the first time, to use the computer to record and mix music.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-13T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/13/my-first-computer.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/12/sony-cfd-boombox.html", "title": "Sony CFD-510 Boombox", "content_html": "A week before I left for college I bought a Sony boombox to use as a bookshelf stereo. It had detachable speakers, so you could actually achieve stereo separation, and, of course, āmega bassā, which was pretty much mandatory for good sound in such small speakers.
\nI chose this particular model because it had an analog 3-band equalizer, as opposed to several genre-specific settings; I relied on the EQ to pick out guitar and bass parts I would transcribe. As a bonus, it didnāt have a crazy light show like the many of the other boomboxes on sale in 1996.
\nI donāt remember very well how it sounded, to be honest, because I wasnāt able to use it that much. My freshman year roommate and I did not share musical tastes, so I had to play my music through my computer using headphones. (My computerās CD-ROM drive actually had a dedicated āplayā button and its own headphone jack.) I didnāt realize it at the time, but all those hours listening to music over headphones (the cheapest headphones possible, Iād say) in my dorm room were the very beginning of my headphone-centric music listening preferences.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-12T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/12/sony-cfd-boombox.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/11/my-first-speaker.html", "title": "My first speaker system", "content_html": "My parents bought me my first CD player at the JC Penney Outlet. It was a damaged, open-box, no-name system that resembled a single, tall unit. It contained, from top to bottom, a turntable (though the clear cover was broken off and missing), an AM/FM radio, a five band equalizer, a dual deck cassette, and a single cd player at the bottom. The only reason I asked for it, and thought my family could afford it, was because it was damaged and was being sold at a steep discount. I also told my parents I would listen to classical music on it, which was my intent, but didnāt actually happen too often.
\nIt came with two bookshelf speakers with RCA inputs that plugged in the rear, that I set up about ten feet away from the receiver. I couldnāt tell you how good or bad the sound was. All I knew at the time is that it was amazing compared to what I had at the time: my momās 20-year-old transistor radio, and a cheap, toy-like boombox with a dual cassette deck. The most important upgrade, of course, was upgrading from records and tapes to CDs. CDs didnāt have tape hiss, had high dynamic range, and didnāt wear out over time or get eaten by the plater sometimes.
\nI blasted music through this no-name system for hundreds of hours through middle school and high school. I measured my school papers by how many album listens it took to write them. I used it to practice singing, to transcribe songs with my guitar, to play back 4-track recordings, to lie back on my bed with CD liner notes while my favorite new song played on repeat.
\nI amassed an enormous CD collection, mostly through the Columbia House and BMG Music clubs, and partly through weekly trips to my local record store (which is long gone now).
\nNow that Iām a parent, I am amazed that all my loud music playing didnāt drive my parents crazy. They never complained to me about my music blasting from 3 PM to 10 PM every day. My kids are too little to listen to music on their own, but Iām already thinking about which headphones to get them, so we can all coexist in the house.
\nI have no idea where this system went or who made it, but, based on it being my first CD player, it is probably the most important speaker system I have ever owned.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-11T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/11/my-first-speaker.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/08/10/speakers-over-the.html", "title": "Speakers over the years", "content_html": "I love music, and I love headphones, but, oddly enough, I have no special love for speakers. The reason, I suppose, is that, since I was a broke teenager living with my parents, I have never had the opportunity to listen to loud, room-filling music at my home. Roommates, sleeping children, and close neighbors have always prevented it. That said, my love of music has always depended on speakers, and, as I got older, they got a little better over the years.
\nIām going to publish a short series of posts about the various speaker systems Iāve had over the years. After that, I will post a short series of posts about all the headphones Iāve had, and loved, over the years, as well.
\n", "date_published": "2018-08-10T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/08/10/speakers-over-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/07/24/tonight-im-working.html", "content_html": "šµ Tonight Iām working overtime and listening to The Hold Steady, which almost makes it all right.
\n", "date_published": "2018-07-23T20:58:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/07/23/tonight-im-working.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/07/17/175357.html", "content_html": "šµ Iām back to my wired OPPO PM-3 & HA-2 SE headphones stack today, listening to Foreverland, by The Divine Comedy. Itās an album that slipped by me in 2016. I used to love The Divine Comedy in the late 1990s, and still take Casanova for a spin every six months or so.
\n![](\"https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/2098/2018/f957d41dd1.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-07-17T13:53:57-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/07/17/175357.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/22/first-listen-mean.html",
"title": "šµ First listen: Mean Girls (Original Broadway Cast)",
"content_html": "Mean Girls (Original Broadway Cast) is up for the Tony for best musical this year, and I think it has a legitimate shot. While this is a weak year for the American musical, the music of “Mean Girls” is fun and catchy, and the lyrics are funny and full of wordplay. The singing and production of the cast album are top notch, too.
\nI like it. The high school setting and girl-centric plot, though not the music, remind me a lot of “Bring It On”, which is another musical that has a fantastic cast album and works a lot better than you would think. I don’t know if this show will be a hit on Broadway, but I predict a long life on high school drama club stages in the future.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-22T16:08:22-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/22/first-listen-mean.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/22/headphones-review-sony.html", "content_html": "š§ Headphones review: Sony MDR-1AM2/B.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-22T11:14:17-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/22/headphones-review-sony.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/18/carry-on-on.html", "title": "šµ Carry On", "content_html": "On this bad and sad news day, remember:
\n\n\nIf you’re lost and alone
\n
\nOr you’re sinking like a stone
\nCarry on
\nMay your past be the sound
\nOf your feed upon the ground and
\nCarry on‘Cause we are, we are shining stars
\n
\nWe are invincible
\nWe are who we are
\nOn our darkest day
\nWhen we’re miles away
\nSo we’ll come, we will find our way home
Fun.’s “Carry On” works well, and feels quite different, in this cover version by the cast of “Rise”.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-18T16:31:06-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/18/carry-on-on.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/18/frozen-the-broadway.html", "title": "šµ Frozen: The Broadway Musical", "content_html": "Listening to the cast recording of “Frozen: The Broadway Musical” for the first time is a bit surreal for me. Compared to the movie, there are new songs, lyrics changes in existing songs, and, of course, different singers. I don’t think any of the changes are for the better. It’s hard to say for sure, though, because, as a parent of a little girl, I’ve heard the movie and the movie soundtrack about 1,000 times already, and it’s burned into my brain.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-18T15:21:01-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/18/frozen-the-broadway.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/11/frightened-rabbit-singer.html", "title": "šµ Frightened Rabbit singer commits suicide š„", "content_html": "(My original title was just an expletive.)
\nBody confirmed as missing Frightened Rabbit singer - BBC News:
\n\n\n“Depression is a horrendous illness that does not give you any alert or indication as to when it will take hold of you”, it added.
\n“Scott battled bravely with his own issues for many years and we are immensely proud of him for being so open with his struggles.
\n“His willingness to discuss these matters in the public domain undoubtedly raised awareness of mental health issues and gave others confidence and belief to discuss their own issues.”
\n
I’m so upset. I love Frightened Rabbit. It was no secret that Scott Hutchison suffered from depression, anxiety, and who knows what elseāit’s all over his arch, wry lyrics. Go listen to “Keep Yourself Warm” to get an idea of what a great singer/songwriter he was.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-11T09:49:38-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/11/frightened-rabbit-singer.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/08/okkervil-rivers-back.html", "title": "šµ Okkervil River's back catalog", "content_html": "Listening to Okkervil River’s new album, In the Rainbow Rain, today gave me an excuse to dive, once again, into their back catalog. I am a huge fan of the band’s 2005-2008 work, a trifecta of literate rock albums: Black Sheep Boy, The Stand Ins, and The Stage Names. Each of these albums is a staggering artistic achievement; each song on them is an evocative short story with enough weight, depth, and maturity to reward repeated listenings.
\nI haven’t spent nearly as many hours listening to their work since then, which which includes The Silver Gymnasium and Away. This, more recent, period is characterized by a darker, more somber tone. It’s easy to imagine the band’s frontman, and only consistent member now, Will Sheff, slowing down, looking back on life, and looking far forward to his eventual death. That’s way heavier stuff than what I normally listen to, but not too heavy to be enjoyable.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-08T17:01:35-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/08/okkervil-rivers-back.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/05/04/groundhog-day-the.html", "title": "šµ Groundhog Day the Musical", "content_html": "Groundhog Day is my second favorite Broadway musical of last year (closely behind “Dear Evan Hansen”, which has more plot-related problems but really terrific music), and the only one I saw. I revisit the cast album from time to time, because it is terrific, and multiple listens reveal hidden depth in the earthy lyrics.
\nBroadway World’s review of the cast album is remarkably spot on.
\n\n\nOn first listen, Minchin’s melodies are captivating. They are undeniably more poppy than his dark, moody, and undulating score for MATILDA; however, it’s obvious that he has written each of these compositions with the same consideration and care that he did with MATILDA. Despite the more simplistic sounding and pop aural soundscape, the melodies are intricately layered showing an artistry and skill that is not apparent in one listening.
\n
I hope Tim Minchin keeps writing musicals. His music and lyrics for his prior show, Matilda, are a masterpiece. (Listen to the London cast recording over the Broadway one if you can; it is a far better performance, though it is missing some of Matilda’s monologues.) “Groundhog Day” doesn’t quite rank as a masterpiece in my book, but it is really, really good.
\n", "date_published": "2018-05-04T19:35:30-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/05/04/groundhog-day-the.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/29/my-slide-into.html", "title": "My slide into audiophile territory, Part 3", "content_html": "\nThis is the third in a series of posts about my realization that I have become an audiophile. The prior post examined what it means to me to be an audiophile.\n\n
Calling yourself an audiophile is a little like calling yourself a rube and not realizing it. Thatās because being an audiophile is a hobby marked far more by spending large amounts of money on speakers (I include headphones here, of course)āspeakers that sound only a tiny bit better than much less expensive speakers, than on anything else. At worst, itās conspicuous consumption wrapped in a superiority complex, or an obsession that has gotten embarrassingly expensive. At best, however, itās about finding new ways to enjoy the music you love, enjoying that music an awful lot with the equipment you have, while keeping a level head about your budget and equipmentās price-to-performance ratio.
\nI, of course, include myself in the latter camp. Iāve spent a good amount of money on headphones at this point, but I am mostly interested in extracting as much value out of themāas many listening hours and as much enjoyment as possibleārather than on what the next better set of headphones will be.
\nI care an awful lot about music. Iāve found, quite accidentally, that there is more detail to be heard in the recordings I love, provided I have better speakers or headphones to listen to them with.
\nI never thought I was missing anything when I listened to everything through $10 Sony earbuds that I would have to replace every three months or so. When I got my first pair of over-ear headphones, though, it opened a new world for me. I heard details in the music I had never noticed before. The soundstage sounded wider. Instruments sounded more distinct, realistic, and separate from each other than I had ever heard before. Drumbeats had a more visceral impact, due to headphone drivers being much larger than those I was used to. On a more basic level, the over-ear headphones had better isolation than the earbuds did, blocking out outside noise, allowing me hear my music even better. Listening to music, something I loved already, became more fun and more exciting than ever before.
\nThose first over-ear headphones, which I credit for opening my eyes to the benefits of higher-end gear, were nothing special. They were a SteelSeries 7H gaming headset, which I received for free in exchange for writing a review. At the time, it was a $130 headset; today they are being sold for $21, proving that you donāt have to spend outrageous amounts of money to get better audio quality. Iām not saying they are the best headphone ever. Compared to Apple and Sony earbuds, though, they sound fantastic. I never would have realized it, if I hadnāt picked them up.
\nThe headphones Iām wearing right now cost a lot more than those SteelSeries cans, and they reveal details in the music that the SteelSeries cannot. They are objectively better. But the much cheaper headphones are still just fine, and sound way better than whatever free pack-ins you got with your smartphone. I enjoyed them and would probably still be using them to this day if they had not broken. (Headphone durability is a separate issue from sound quality, and can be worth spending more money on.)
\nThe jump from $10 headphones to $130 headphones was definitely worth it to me. Each jump up in price I have made since then was worth it, too. (I didnāt get all my headphones for free!) If I hadnāt tried headphones better than the ones I was used to, I never would have known that better sound was even possible.
\nAfter a certain dollar amount, each additional dollar spent on audio equipment buys you less and less of an improvement in quality. This is the law of diminishing marginal returns, and itās a very real thing.
\nAudiophiles can spend stupid amounts of money on headphones and speakers. (To me, the āstupidā threshold is over $400; it may be way higher or way lower to you.) Some headphones cost well over a thousand dollars. Still other models, designed, I think, for for people with more money than sense, retail for three thousand dollars or more. Some speakers cost tens of thousands of dollars. In addition, some people spend hundreds or thousands on receivers, amps, DACs, and whatever other signal processing they want to use to drive their headphones or speakers. The audiophile hobby can get extremely expensive, if you have the money and are never satisfied with what you have. It doesnāt have to be, though.
\nIn my opinion, you have to stop spending money on audio equipment at some point. If you are never satisfied with what you have, the problem may be something other than not having spent enough to buy decent hardware. You can still be an audiophile without buying new equipment all the time or going broke (or merely being ripped off) on over-expensive gear. Itās about the love of the gameāthe love of music and the gear it plays onānot the love of spending or the fear of missing out on an even better thing.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-29T23:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/29/my-slide-into.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/22/i-had-a.html", "content_html": "š§ I had a lot of fun testing out the V-Moda Crossfade 2 headphones last night. My review is on Amazon.
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/b50778f79d.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-04-22T08:58:21-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/22/i-had-a.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/19/frank-turner-isall.html",
"content_html": "šµ Frank Turner isāall at onceāliterate, angry, cynical, hurt, sad, and tender on Love Ire & Song (Well, literate except for comma usage. š) Despite the negative emotions he expresses, his music is lively and compelling.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-19T16:25:42-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/19/frank-turner-isall.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/17/taking-a-trip.html", "content_html": "šµ Taking a trip down memory lane with Guster’s Keep It Together this evening, on my MacBook Pro and Oppo PM-3’s š§. Their records are cleanly produced, tightly written, and tastefully played. When I saw them live, though, they absolutely shredded their way through their songs. They were freaking amazing.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-16T22:22:09-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/16/taking-a-trip.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/10/space-gunhttpsitunesapplecomusalbumspacegun-by.html", "content_html": "šµ “Space Gun” by Guided by Voices sounds just as good and just as vital as their old stuff.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-10T15:40:24-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/10/space-gunhttpsitunesapplecomusalbumspacegun-by.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/09/im-really-digging.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m really digging Bleachers' “Gone Now” right now. I like everything that Jack Antonoff does.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-09T16:42:27-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/09/im-really-digging.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/04/03/i-relistened-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I re-listened to The Decemberists' I’ll Be Your Girl today, and was surprised that all the songs sounded like I had always known them. I enjoyed the album a lot more today than on my first listen.
\n", "date_published": "2018-04-03T16:42:41-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/04/03/i-relistened-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/03/26/max-richters-sleep.html", "title": "šµ Max Richter's \"Sleep\"", "content_html": "I am unreasonably excited to learn about Max Richter’s 8 1/2 hour album “Sleep”. It is meant to be played all night long, as you sleep. What I have heard so far is quiet, relaxing, and beautiful. I doubt my wife would let us play it through the night while we sleep. But maybe we could play it instead of white noise for our kids.
\n", "date_published": "2018-03-25T21:11:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/03/25/max-richters-sleep.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/03/20/im-trying-to.html", "content_html": "šµ I’m trying to form an opinion of The Decemberists' new album, “I’ll Be Your Girlā. I haven’t gotten my mind around it quite yet. Has it really been 7 years since āThe King Is Deadā!?
\n", "date_published": "2018-03-19T22:18:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/03/19/im-trying-to.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/03/09/my-slide-into.html", "title": "My slide into audiophile territory, Part 2", "content_html": "\nThis is the second in a series of posts about my realization that I have become an audiophile. The prior post examined why I think of myself as an audiophile now.\n\n
So, Iām an audiophile now. What does that even mean? Am I just an overexcited consumer with enough disposable income to blow a lot of money on headphones? Hopefully there is more to it than that.
\nA lot of people, when talking about speakers or headphones, preface their comments with āIām not an audiophile, butā¦ā They do so out of humility, to admit their own limitations of hearing, and their own lack of experience discerning good sounding speakers from mediocre ones. What it is really about, however, is saying that you are not a snob. I used to do that, too. But Iāve given myself leeway to put myself in the audiophile camp, despite my lack of ear training and my lack of sophisticated acoustical measuring equipment. I want to take the term āaudiophileā back from the snobs.
\nI call myself an audiophile now because I love sound. I love sound so much that I listen to music hours and hours each day. I love sound so much that I will listen to types of music I didnāt like beforeāEDM, hip-hop, country, standards, soundtracksājust because they sound good. I love sound so much I will spend largeābut not obscene or unlimitedāamounts of money on decent equipment.
\nMy love of sound itself is a relatively new development. While I have loved music as long as I can remember, what drove that love was always the melody, the song structure, the lyrics, and the performanceāall the normal things people enjoy about music. The production, on the other hand, was not important to me. In fact, over-produced recordings turned me off, because studio slickness betrayed, in my opinion, the authenticity of the music.
\nNow, I think differently. I admire the craft of studio engineers in a way I never appreciate before. Some recordings just sound great, and that is part of the pleasure of listening to them. Similarly, some singers have have beautiful voices, and it doesnāt matter if they are singing the same old songs (ahem, standards): the sound of their voices brings life to the music and helps make it worthwhile to listen to.
\nTo me, being an audiophile is about appreciating the distinction between the sound and the music, and deriving pleasure from it, far more than it is about spending vast amounts of money on expensive equipment, or believing the hokum perpetrated by high-end audio equipment manufacturers and sellers.
\n", "date_published": "2018-03-10T00:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/03/09/my-slide-into.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/03/09/i-have-become.html", "content_html": "šµ I have become a huge Lana Del Rey fan recently. I can’t get enough of her lushly produced dream pop. (Maybe I’m depressed or something. š)
\n", "date_published": "2018-03-09T17:59:23-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/03/09/i-have-become.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/03/09/004415.html", "content_html": "šµ “If I had my time again” is my favorite song from Tim Minchin’s “Groundhog Day” musical. I love how it flips the premise of the show on its head for a bit and lets the female lead shine.
\n", "date_published": "2018-03-08T20:44:15-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/03/08/004415.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/18/abc-testing-august.html", "title": "A/B/C testing: August and Everything After, in 24-bit, 96kHz FLAC vs. 16-bit, 44.1kHz ALAC vs. 256 kbps AAC", "content_html": "I’m listening tonight to a “hi-res” 24-bit, 96kHz lossless version of “August and Everything Afterā through my good headphones, DAC, and amp tonight. I love this album. It helps that I was 15 when it came out, of course. But still, I think it is an emotionally rich artistic achievement. It surprised me when such an earnest, heartfelt record became wildly popular; only in the 1990s would that happen, I guess.
\nI compared this hi-res version, track by track, with two other versions I have on hand:
\nThe main improvement the hi-res version brings over the CD-quality rip, to my ears, is a lower noise floor. Otherwise, it sounds the same as the CD version. You gain about 1-2% in fidelity at the price of lot of extra bits on the hard drive, and, perhaps, more dollars out of your wallet. This is true even though the 24-bit version was mastered to be a little quieter than the original CD and iTunes versions. You have to turn it up a notch to match the others' volume. Even with more amplification, the hi-res version’s noise floor is incredibly low, and everything sounds fantastic.
\nOverall, I would prefer to listen to all my music in lossless quality, in as high fidelity as possible. It can sound better than lossy rips, and, even if I canāt hear the difference on a particular track, why not listen to the best version available? That said, I subscribe to Apple Music, which serves AAC files, rather than Tidal, which has a lossless streaming plan, primarily for convenience. Fortunately, for me, Appleās 256kbps AAC files are completely adequate substitutes for lossless rips. I do think, though, that if Apple offered a lossless plan at a slight up-charge, I would subscribe to it.
\n", "date_published": "2018-02-19T00:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/18/abc-testing-august.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/18/if-you-like.html", "content_html": "šµ If you like The Weakerthans as much as I do, you will find this interview with their singer, John K. Samson, fascinating.
\n", "date_published": "2018-02-18T00:46:03-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/17/if-you-like.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/13/my-slide-into.html", "title": "My slide into audiophile territory, Part 1", "content_html": "\nThis is the first in a series of posts about my realization that I have become an audiophile.\n\n
I have realized recently that I have slowly but surely slipped from the category of ānormal personā to the category of āaudiophileā. I never would call myself an audiophile before, so this is somewhat shocking to me.
\nI always thought that audiophiles were people who threw away thousands of dollars, unnecessarily, on audio equipment–speakers, headphones, DACs, and so onāto āhearā āsomethingā that I could never, ever hear myself, and was probably not even there. After realizing that I spent, probably, $1,000 or more on audio equipment last year, I think I need to brand myself with the āaudiophileā label. I am listening to lots of music and enjoying it immensely, but there is something clearly wrong with me. (Just kiddingāI think.)
\nA princely four-figure sum over the course of 2017 netted me some great equipment:
\nEven with all that great stuff at my listening desk, I am still dying to buy a HomePod (or two, even), open-back headphones from HifiMan, B&O Play headphones of some kind (did they just discontinue all their wired models?), and maybe a HifiBerry or a piece of Schiit to turn one of my old Raspberry Pis back into an AirPlay receiver.
\nI have no idea why this is. All I know is that the good audio equipment I have now has made all the other speakers in the house sound like garbage to me. In a way, I am glad I donāt have the money right now to buy any of this stuff. I certainly donāt need any of it, and it wonāt make my life any better.
\nHow did I slip from being a normal music listener to an audiophile or audiophile wannabe? I have a very good excuseāor, more likely, a series of somewhat poor excuses that snowballed into $1,000+ of spending on audio equipment in one year:
\nI thought it would be fun to write about all my gear from one the years, from the first crappy boombox to the amazing headphones and DAV/amp combo I am rocking these days. This is the first post in that series.
\n", "date_published": "2018-02-14T00:00:00-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/13/my-slide-into.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/08/in-high-school.html", "content_html": "šµ In high school and college, I used to measure how long it took me to write a paper by the number of CDs I listened to while working on it. I think a normal high school paper was 4 albums (R.E.M., Beatles, U2, Pink Floyd) or about 3 hours. I should do that again with my š§.
\n", "date_published": "2018-02-08T10:41:39-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/08/in-high-school.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/07/after-reading-all.html", "content_html": "After reading all the reviews, (like this one) I really want two HomePods with AirPlay 2 working. (Oh, god, what is wrong with me?! š)
\n", "date_published": "2018-02-06T22:22:44-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/06/after-reading-all.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/02/01/im-thoroughly-enjoying.html", "content_html": "I’m thoroughly enjoying Matt Birchler’s “HomePod Testing” playlist on Apple Music šµ. Each track is well produced and interesting. It’s great music to work to.
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/390bb06eb4.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-02-01T12:04:52-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/02/01/im-thoroughly-enjoying.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/27/i-am-too.html",
"content_html": "I am too busy coding tonight to order a HomePod. The audiophile part of me really wants one, though. I have a fancy BeoPlay M3 speaker already, but I think the HomePod has cooler tech and is just large enough to sound a whole lot better.
\n", "date_published": "2018-01-26T22:59:02-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/26/i-am-too.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/15/its-a-quiet.html", "content_html": "It’s a quiet workday. I am coding and debugging in C# once again, at least until more audit work rolls in. I’m listening to the Cranberries for a sad reason, too šµ.
\n", "date_published": "2018-01-15T16:26:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/15/its-a-quiet.html", "tags": ["Audiophile"] }, { "id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/13/its-a-road.html", "content_html": "Itās a road trip day for me and my family. Picking the driving music šµ is the hardest part. We mostly stick to Laurie Berliner Band and Hamilton. Iād love it if we could branch out more from there.
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/0ade6348ae.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-01-13T10:58:29-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/13/its-a-road.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/12/every-few-days.html",
"content_html": "Every few days I have to talk myself out of buying another pair of headphones. I don’t need the HifiMan HE-400i, and their sound leakage probably wouldn’t suit my listening needs at all, but I canāt stop thinking about adding an open-backed headphone to my meager collection.
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/6cc2d36edd.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-01-12T17:25:34-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/12/every-few-days.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/05/i-happened-slowly.html",
"content_html": "It happened slowly, but preferred music playback device size and wire count have gone up for me over time. 2010: iPod Shuffle. 2017: iPad Air 2 & Oppo HA2-SE.
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/8480213f4d.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-01-05T10:09:09-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/05/i-happened-slowly.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2018/01/04/dear-apple-music.html",
"content_html": "Dear Apple Music: Just because I listened to Sixpence Non The Richer’s cover of “There She Goes” (originally by the La’s, and arguably about heroin, for goodness sake), doesn’t mean I want to listen to Christian music in all my personalized mixes. š
\n![](\"http://mjdescy.micro.blog/uploads/2018/f15a2eda19.jpg\")
\n",
"date_published": "2018-01-04T15:45:08-04:00",
"url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2018/01/04/dear-apple-music.html",
"tags": ["Audiophile","Tech","Apple"]
},
{
"id": "http://mjdescy.micro.blog/2017/12/26/and-when-they.html",
"content_html": "And when they say that all is lost\nAll is not lost, all is not lost\nAnd when they say that all is lost\nAll is not lost, no all is not lost at all
\nāOK Go\n“All Is Not Lost”\nVideo
\n", "date_published": "2017-12-25T21:40:36-04:00", "url": "https://micro.mjdescy.me/2017/12/25/and-when-they.html", "tags": ["Audiophile","Thoughts"] } ] }